How to Turn Your 3-axis Gimbal Into a Time Lapse Motion Control System

In his YouTube video and blog post, young Polish filmmaker Tomasz Walczak explains how he turned his 3-axis gimbal stabilizer into a time lapse motion control system. The results are quite interesting, taking a creative advantage of the 3-axis capabilities to create unique dynamic “twisting” movements thanks to the gimbal’s stabilization.

If you want to try this out, your gimbal stabilizer needs to be based on the Alexmos controller which is used in a wide variety of today’s stabilizers. If you can use the SimpleBGC desktop software or smartphone app to control and setup your gimbal, then congratulations: your gimbal has the right controller.

You can check out a full list of gimbal manufacturers using the SimpleBGC software from BaseCam here. Some of the popular ones are: Easy Stab, Ikan Beholder, Pilotfly, CAME-TV, Kinematik or Letus.

Feeling motivated to further experiment with your gimbal after watching this video? Go ahead and check out Tomasz’s blog post where he explains the whole process in detail. I can imagine taking this concept to a next level by mounting this system to a motorized slider. The movement possibilities would then be almost limitless.

Freefly Akira 5.0 Firmware

Freefly also has a similar Timelapse feature in their MōVi stabilizers with the Akira 5.0 Firmware as we wrote about last year. You can check the demonstration video below:

How do you like the “twisting” movement for timelapse motion control? Have you tried the timelapse feature on your stabilizer? Let us know in the comments below.

Jakub Han is a freelance filmmaker based in Vienna. He is passionate about action sports filming and interested in new technology and filming gear. He has now six years of experience in filming and editing.

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Jakub Han is a freelance filmmaker based in Vienna. He is passionate about action sports filming and interested in new technology and filming gear. He has now six years of experience in filming and editing.